


You broke your funny

by Karfraegh18



Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Angst, Drama, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-22
Updated: 2009-12-22
Packaged: 2018-09-03 04:08:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8696005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Karfraegh18/pseuds/Karfraegh18
Summary: A one off time stamp in the sick!Jensen verse. Jensen loses a friend... Jared loses his funny...





	

**Author's Note:**

> Note from the Sinful Desire archivists: this story was originally archived at [Sinful-Desire.org](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Sinful_Desire). To preserve the archive, we began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in November 2016. We e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact us using the e-mail address on [Sinful Desire collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/sinfuldesire/profile).

Melanie Hodges was 31, the same age as Jensen Ackles when she died. She was his friend. Her birthday, for ease of memory was three days after Jensen’s, which is why she got away with calling him old man. They were friends, had only been friends for the last year, but they had so much in common. She wasn’t an actress, she was a lawyer, she wasn’t tall, she was five foot four in heels, she had brown eyes, not green, she didn’t like football, or basketball, wasn’t from Texas, and didn’t drink beer. She was someone who joked about keeping his seat warm for him when he was in with the physiotherapist, she was the one who brought him coffee and blackmailed him into signing the cup so she could sell it on Ebay. She was a powerhouse of positive thinking in those times when Jensen had none, and the best person to talk to when he needed to talk. She was friends with Jared, friends with Eric, friends with the nurse who ran the night shift, and friends with the janitor who haunted the halls with mop and bucket. She wrote stories when her hands let her, reminisced to Jensen when her thoughts un-muddled themselves to become coherent fact. She adored Brad Pitt, but only in Troy, and loved her family to distraction, she proclaimed herself a Sam girl after watching Heart, and a Dean girl after watching _that episode where you mow the lawn_. She didn’t really follow the story very well, her memory was hurt, in pain, and it suffered much with things that didn’t absolutely need to be remembered. 

 

Her tumour wasn’t benign, but she accepted it with the bravery that was individual to her, with tears and laughter and a unique quirky outlook on life. Where Jensen got to go home after physio and where Jensen had Jared holding his hand and helping him through each day, she had to stay in her room, with the clock ticking away her hours tick by deafening tock. Her family would visit, but it is, she acknowledged to Jared over coffee and bagels, and with no small amount of courage, very difficult for people to watch others die in this slow soul destroying way that was happening to her. The doctors had given her six months, she made it to ten, and when she died, the hospital sighed around her with the loss. Jensen didn’t find out until his next physio session, two days later, a virus knocking him for six, screwing with his days. _I’m sorry Mr Ackles, but Melanie left us on Tuesday, it was a relief to her I think, she was so tired._

 

And so he stood here now at her funeral, in a black coat, a scarf around his neck his face open to the frosty Vancouver air wondering at the fates that decided Jensen Ackles should live whilst Melanie should die. Jared was watching him; in fact he had been watching him since Jensen returned home in a state of stunned shock with the news of his friend’s death. It alternately unnerved and scared Jensen to catch Jared looking at him with such naked raw need in his face. He wondered what was in his friend’s head, in his lover’s head. Was it a _thank you_ that it was Melanie and not Jensen that had died? After all Jared still had his hand twisted in Jensen’s a tangible proof of life and Melanie was cold in front of them, the casket closed to the frigid wind. Jared was probably at least some part relieved. Thing is, and this is what isolated him from the funeral, from Jared, from the family… damn it he was relieved it wasn’t him. To hold life in his hands when it had almost been taken away from him… He bowed his head, guilt just wrapped around his heart strangling him of the ability to get composure and the words of the eulogy were lost to him in his sudden panic.

 

It seemed so immediate, so sudden, before she was lowered in to the frost baked ground, Jensen taking a step back, suddenly dizzy at the empty yawning hole that was taking his friend. Jared stumbled at the move, gripped Jensen’s hand tighter, looking at half closed eyes and wanting so much to say the right words, but having nothing there to make anything any better. They stood to the back, family milling around the emptiness, the bite of a bitter wind snapping words from their mouths and pushing them to the two men who huddled beneath a winter-skeleton tree.

 

_I don’t know how it can seem so right that she has gone…. She is in a better place… she was so very ill…_

 

_She wasn’t our Melanie any more_

 

Jensen wanted to shout, but he couldn’t be sure that his words would come out the way he wanted them too. It was still so damn difficult to form and vocalise original thought. He wanted to tell them that she _had_ been Melanie, that it was just a different Melanie; her heart had still been the same.

 

“Jensen?” That was Jared’s voice, and it was so clear, so defined, so solid, and Jensen gripped harder to his hand, needing to hear the sense that Jared could make of this.

 

”I need to go,” Jensen said softly, “can we go?” 

 

Jared’s eyes widened, “you don’t want to go to the wake?” they hadn’t actually talked about going back to Melanie’s father’s house, but Jared just kind of assumed. 

 

“No, no… can we go?” 

 

Jared nodded simply, giving his lover’s hand a reassuring squeeze and pulling him to Melanie’s parents, saying their goodbyes, accepting the thanks that her quietly mourning family gave to them and then moving to the car, Jensen’s SUV, not Jared’s low slung sports car, the one in their garage that was solid, staid, quiet and careful. The journey home was short, tears choking in Jensen’s throat, the evening drawing in and the darkness hiding any tears that rolled down his face, until finally they arrived back at their house, the dogs welcoming them with the usual demands for treats and _outside now_. Jared threw Jensen a quick look of regret that he had to deal with the dogs, “Gimme five,” he offered. Jensen nodded in return stripping off his jacket and moving into the front room, pulling curtains at the window, and flicking on the Christmas tree lights. Sighing he slumped onto the sofa, exhaustion flooding him, a headache building behind his eyes, a twinge of worry at the niggle of pain, a reminder of when a headache meant nothing more than too much Jack or Jose. 

 

He listened to the reassuring sound of Jared talking to his babies, dishing out food, fussing over their cold fur, promising them long walks in the morning, before finally sliding in to _his_ spot next to Jensen, coffee in his hand and a concerned look on his face. He could see the tiredness around Jensen’s eyes, knew how hard it had been to go to the funeral today, and he twisted so he was able to support Jensen, pulling him between his spread legs, back against his chest and wrapping long arms around him, his left hand resting on Jensen’s heart.

 

“I knew I shouldn’t have gone to the funeral.” Jensen’s voice was so low it was difficult to hear and Jared didn’t understand what his boyfriend had said at first.

 

“Why babe?”

 

“I wanted so bad to say things… I almost did…” Jensen’s voice tailed off…

 

“What like?” Jared already knew what Jensen was trying to say, had heard the same words Jensen had, the soft acceptance in her family’s voices.

 

“She was still in there you know, in all the confusion of what the tumour was doing to her brain, it was still Mel that was inside.” Jensen’s voice hitched on a small sob, he hadn’t really given into the fear inside him, the fear that it could have been him lying there, but for the vagaries of fate.

 

“They only saw what she _had_ been,” Jared began softly, “they were grieving what they were losing, what they knew she had lost.” _Did that even make sense?_

 

”Which is why I said nothing.” Jensen nodded, leaning deeper into Jared’s embrace. He was like a furnace, radiating heat in the Vancouver-chilled house, and it was comforting and welcoming and real.

 

They sat in silence, the lights brighter in the darkening room, the heating kicking in and the dogs curling at their feet. The tree lights glittered in the darkness, sending patterns of colour onto the wall, and it felt like the promise of Christmas was just around the corner waiting to share. The semi darkness was soothing, relaxing, and Jensen found himself relaxing into Jared’s hold, his head spinning with three months of memories of Melanie.

 

“Do you remember the coffee machine thing, with the filter?” Jensen reminisced, a small chuckle rumbling in his chest, the day that Mel had decided to change the filter and ended up taking the power out for the whole left side of the physio wing. Jared laughed, tightening his grip around his lover and adding in his own memories, until both men were exchanging stories and remembering Melanie as the cute ditzy blonde she actually was underneath all the tubes and the medications.

 

“I’ll never be able to thank her properly for what she did for me.” Jared finally said softly, as they lay there, quiet, thinking back on Melanie and the place she had in their lives. 

 

Jensen looked back, confusion on his face, “tell me,” he asked, wondering what Jared had needed Mel for, when he had been so strong for Jensen through this whole thing.

 

“It was the day… when we heard you may not get your speech back properly…” Jared started, his voice full of emotion at the memory. Jensen remembered that day vividly, the doctor calm, sensible, promising nothing, only that the slurring and the confusion may never clear up one hundred percent. Jensen remembered looking to Jared for help, for him to say the doctor was wrong, and seeing tears of defeat in Jared’s eyes. Ice-sharp tears that welled in hazel green eyes and hovered before being blinked away in a rare show of disbelief and fear. It had been Jensen reassuring Jared that day, after all, Jensen reasoned for Jared’s sake, he didn’t need to work as an actor, there were other things he could do, he could be a kept man if it came to it. Jensen was moved out into physio and it was all Jared could do to keep it together as soon as the doors closed behind Jensen. There were months of worry and strain, good news, then bad news, an emotional roller coaster of joy then sadness that had just about dumped the tall Texan on the floor and left him there in major meltdown. “She found me.”

 

“Found you?”

 

Jared smiled, and dropped a kiss to Jensen’s neck, “I was hiding… well, as much as a tree can hide in amongst all those itty bitty nurses, and she didn’t say much, just four words really, but they were four words that smacked me around the face quicker than months of therapy.”

 

“What did she say Jay?” 

 

”She just said, _you broke your funny_ , and it made complete sense.”

 

“You broke your funny?” Jensen wasn’t sure he was following this, but yes, it did sound like the kind of quirky sentence that Mel would utter.

 

“I was trying to be there for you, to support you, to show you, all the time, that I loved you so damned hard…” Jared stopped, his words tripping off of his tongue and becoming confused in his head, he wasn’t sure how much he should explain. Jensen twisted in Jared’s hold, moving to straddle Jared’s lap, and lifting his lover’s chin with his hand to see tears.

 

“You _were_ there for me… Jay you still are… without you…” he didn’t need to say how much Jared’s love had meant to him, so very scared Jared would turn tail and run at the first sign of his illness leaving him anything less than a whole man. Jared shrugged, where else would he be? 

 

“That day… she saw me… she saw I had become so focused, so damn intent, on positive thinking, on being _determined_ everything was going to be OK, that I could somehow will it to be OK just by saying it was so… that I lost the part of me that makes me _me_ …” Jensen could almost sense where this was going, but he guessed Jared needed to get it off his chest, so sat quietly, just waiting. “So she says that I have broken my funny, but I like to think what she meant was I had lost my ability to roll with the knocks, to see the positive in things, and one thing, just one thing, was going to break me if I wasn’t careful.”

 

”And that one thing was my voice not being right?” 

 

“The voice, yes, but also the confusion, and you maybe just not being _my Jensen_ anymore.”

 

“So what happened next?”

 

“Well she tried to make me a coffee and that was when the whole blowing the wing up came into action.” Jared chuckled low in his throat.

 

“Then we have a lot to thank her for, she kept me sane through all the physio and she sorted out your funny.” Jensen leaned down and captured warm lips with his, kiss biting and soothing the small touch with his tongue. Jared shifted under him and settled Jensen firmer and centred, angling his head to deepen the kiss, he could never get enough of kissing this man, the taste of him, could never get enough of the fact that he was alive and here with him. He didn’t want to ever let him go, tangling his tongue as the kisses heated and he groaned low in his throat, his hands cupping Jensen’s face, holding the feel of him tight under his fingers. So much had been taken from them this year, with the chemo and the threat of death, that just to have proof of life here in his reach was enough to make him weep. 

 

“Bed I think.” Jared finally said.

 

Jensen clambered off of Jared’s lap, extending a hand to help his lover up, and checking doors and lights and dogs the climbed the stairs. Jensen stumbled on the fourth step, he was still just this side of clumsy, his coordination just a little bit off, but Jared was there, catching the stumble and knocking shoulders with a smile. It was just natural, that Jared was there for him, and he didn’t think Jared even realised he was doing it, and he said that even as Jared moved in to help Jensen with the fiddly buttons on his white dress shirt, pulling them apart one by one.

 

“I know what I am doing Mr Ackles and when I am doing it, if I left you to open these buttons then I wont get laid until New Years.” Jensen snorted his amusement, shrugging off the now open shirt and allowing it to fall to the floor, Jared making an appreciative noise and moving in to touch acres of freckled skin. Jared’s touch was like fire against his skin, tracing the muscles and the treasure trail that led below. Jensen had lost weight, it was inevitable, he had been so ill for so long, but he was starting to get back to a fighting weight, his chest still broad and begging to be touched. He bent forward, tracing a prayer of kisses on taut skin, each kiss accompanied by single words, Jensen’s name, words of love, of thanks…

 

Jared pulled back stripping his clothes, helping Jensen out of the rest of his, until finally they lay naked and entwined under the warm quilt, exchanging soft lazy kisses, a certain desperation in Jensen that Jared could almost taste. The kisses turned to hunger and the touching turned to need so strong, so sudden that it took Jensen’s breath, rolling onto his back and drawing Jared with him so that his reassuring weight was pinning him to the bed. Jared lifted heavy lidded eyes to search his lover’s face, a question in the tilt of his head. “You OK?” In answer Jensen just arched his back pressing himself hard and insistent against Jared, his expression one that Jared easily recognised as the _stop talking idiot_ expression.

 

From then on it was all about touch and taste and sharing, murmured words and finding the edge, more kisses and promises exchanged in the dark. Jared reached between them, closing his large hand around them both, setting a rhythm as their kisses became more about sharing breathing than anything else, sloppy and uncoordinated in their need to touch. It was Jensen that lost it first, hot and wet and a groan low in his throat as he arched in to the orgasm and it took very little time for Jared to follow him over with a muffled shout, falling loose limbed and heavy on to Jensen.

 

“Heavy…” Jensen murmured, his hands moving to grip Jared tight even as he knew he should push him off. It just felt so good, Jared’s hard muscles where he was softer, his hair long against Jensen’s face, every single inch of Jared… all his…

 

Jared closed his eyes and buried his face into Jensen’s neck, the grief of the funeral and the love under his hands, mixing and churning in his heart, “I love you Jackles, you will never… never… know how much I love you.”

 

Jensen simply pulled Jared closer, his eyes half closing in sleep, his hands lifting and twisting into Jared’s long hair, “and I love you Jared, you and your funny.”


End file.
